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Harry Potter Casts a Spell
on Student Readers
With Saturday's scheduled release of the next book in the Harry Potter series,
reading and literacy are getting a lot of air time this week -- and there's
good news. As explained in The Scotsman article linked in the News section
above,
the Federation of Children's Book Groups reports that students are spending
more time reading as a result of the book series. Explore the Harry Potter
phenomenon
in your classroom with these resources.
Read "Stepping into the Wardrobe: A Fantasy Genre Study" (E) from Language
Arts to see how two teachers moved their students from reading the genre
simply
for
entertainment’s sake to exploring its more complex characteristics and
ideas. Tap the resources in the ReadWriteThink lesson plan
Genre
Study: A Collaborative Approach (E) as part of your study. The lesson includes
a Fantasy
Bookmark that students can use to gather examples as they read the latest
Harry Potter novel or another book.
For an extended discussion of the fantasy genre, read "Teaching
Fantasy: Overcoming the Stigma of Fluff," (M-S-C) from English Journal,
which touches on mythic and heroic cycles, religious overtones, and gender
roles in a variety of fantasy texts.
Explore characterization in Harry Potter with the ReadWriteThink lesson Action
Is Character: Exploring Character Traits with Adjectives (M). The lesson
invites students "become" one of the major characters in
a book and describe themselves and other characters, using lists of accurate,
powerful adjectives. The worksheet instructions demonstrate the project with
examples from Harry
Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone.
Try the ReadWriteThink lesson plan Book
Report Alternative: Character and Author Business Cards (M), which includes
a sample
business card for Hermione, as another option for exploring character.
After analyzing the sample, invite students to create business cards
for the rest of the characters in
the series.
The English Journal article "The
Sorcerer’s Stone: A Touchstone for Readers of all Ages" focuses on the first book in the
series and includes specific ideas for talking about the book in the classroom,
including analysis of character, myth and legend, the literary element of
foreshadowing, and the text's use of dialect and vernacular language.
"The
Rhetoric of the Sentence" (M-S-C), from Chapter
4 of NCTE's Grammar
Alive, demonstrates the links between sentence structure
and the effectiveness of language, using an excerpt
from the beginning of Harry
Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.
Even those who aren't reading the novel can talk about Harry Potter this
week. Ask students to do a close reading of the advertisements and related
hype for the newest novel in
the
series with student using the techniques from
the Teaching English in the Two-Year
College
article
"Advertising
and
Interpretive
Analysis: Developing
Reading, Thinking, and Writing Skills in the Composition Course"
(S-C). The article's section "Methodology: How to 'Read' an
Ad" provides a specific model that teachers can use in the classroom.
Extend your exploration
of
Harry
Potter
through
July
31st,
with
the
resources
in this ReadWriteThink calendar entry: J.K.
Rowling and her Harry Potter celebrate their birthdays this month (G).
NOTE: Free access to journal articles mentioned in this Inbox is provided
for 21 days. After this free access period expires, articles are available
to journal subscribers only. This Inbox Idea was published 07-12-2005.
Initials in annotations indicate academic level of the resource (E=Elementary,
M=Middle, S=Secondary, C=College, G=General).
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